In Blois, socialist activists believe that the solution could come from their ranks

The Socialist Party’s summer university opened on Thursday in Blois against a backdrop of internal divisions with Emmanuel Macron, who has ruled out the possibility of a government from the NFP.

Family explanations at the PS summer campus. The socialists have been meeting since Thursday, August 29 for two days in Blois, in Loir-et-Cher. The divisions over the strategy to adopt with regard to Emmanuel Macron are at the heart of the activists’ discussions, while the head of state has ruled out the option of Lucie Castets, the candidate of the New Popular Front for Matignon. Emmanuel Macron, for his part, assures that he “makes every effort, days and nights” For “find the best solution” for France and that he will speak “to the French in due time and in the right framework”.

Among the activists, Sylvie does not go unnoticed, with her glasses, her necklace and her pink vest, the color of the PS. But she could also have worn green, the color of hope for Lucie Castets at Matignon, the candidate of the New Popular Front. “We are eagerly awaiting our future Prime Minister”she insists. But many activists, like José, no longer really believe it: “The president said no, so it’s no.”

“I’m not Nostradamus, he’ll have to line someone up.”

José, PS activist

to franceinfo

Liliane, a PS activist for over 30 years, hopes that it will be a socialist or at least a left-wing personality, “Because in any case, to change people’s lives, there is only the left. All the great reforms have been made by the leftshe assures. We have to tell ourselves that there are difficulties, that we are in a pivotal period, but that we, the socialists, the left, we carry hope. So I hope so.”

Elie, an activist since 1981 who says he is anti-La France Insoumise, wants the party to find “its” candidate for Matignon “who is capable of bringing together people beyond the Socialist Party, he explains. Because here, we must keep our partners. I am not the PC, I am not the Greens, but we must unite on that side and unite more broadly at the level of the centre right.”

“If we go back to the old ways that we had with the Hollande line and the Hollande mandate, it could disappoint many people, including me.”

Julien, young socialist activist

to franceinfo

But “attention, Julien answers, There are still risks that it will cause the party to implode a little. So, at a time when the party is restructuring itself, is getting good electoral results again, it could create a negative dynamic. That is the heart of the issue. I am 25 years old, I have been a socialist activist for six months and if I joined the Socialist Party, it is precisely because it seemed to me that the Socialist Party had a new line with a more left-wing, social, ecological line and was breaking with a certain line.” The PS is rebuilding itself but the structure remains fragile, insists this activist who hopes that his party will neither lean too far to the left, towards the rebels, nor too far to the right, towards Macron.